Katherine Phillips ( Fowler) :1 January 1631 - 18 January 1664

Katherine Philips was born in London, the daughter of a prosperous cloth merchant John Fowler, and and her mother, Katherine (Oxenbridge)and was sent to a boarding school, 

At sixteen she married a Welshman, James Philips, a substantial landowner in Wales, and thereafter lived here in my  hometown of  Aberteifi/ Cardigan and their home here the Priory became a literary centre. It was here that, in the mode of the time, she was accorded the fancy name of Orinda, soon to be expanded into 'the Matchlless Orinda'. Her poems and letters make frequent reference to Cardigan and its surroundings.  They lived here for the rest of their lives, with one interlude in Dublin and frequent visits to London for parliamentary sittings, as James Philips was MP in successive parliaments between 1653 and 1662.

Katherine Philips  is best known for her poetry on the theme of friendship, but she also gained success as a translator: amongst others, she translated the French play ‘La mort de Pompée’ by Corneille, which was performed in Dublin, and subsequently published in Dublin and London.  

James Philips was a prominent Parliamentary supporter who signed Charles I's death-warrant in 1649.    Katherine seems to have started to write poetry soon after she got married, and she was "discovered" by the Welsh  metaphysical  poet Henry Vaughan,https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.com/2009/11/henry-vaughan-silurist-hermeticist.html who praised the work of "The Matchless Orinda" in his Olor Iscanus.  Vaughan subsequently published a memorial poem Katharine had written for the poet and playwright William Cartwright (1611-1643). It was at this time that she began to use "Orinda" as a pen-name, and wrote poetry principally of a personal nature to Mary Aubrey, her "Rosania".  After Mary's marriage Katharine's chief poetic "correspondent" became Anne Owen, or "Lucasia." 

During the Civil War Katherine harboured royalist sympathies in spite of her puritan upbringing and marriage; she duly celebrated the Restoration in 1660, but could not avoid being caught up in her husband's problems. As a regicide, James Philips was lucky to avoid prosecution, but he lost his position as an MP, and most of the land he had acquired as a gift from Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell was reposessed by the Crown.After her husbands death she lived in Dublin, where she translated Corniell's ' Pompee', her version being played with much success at the Dublin Smock Alley Theatre.

In the end, however, Katherine was lucky; her husband's reputation was saved by Sir Charles Cotterell, Charles II's Master of Ceremonies

Cotterell was interested in the hand of Katherine's friend Anne Owen, and because of the help given to him by the Philipses, Cotterell interceded for James Philips. In the end, Anne did not marry Cotterell, but Katherine and Cotterell remained friends, and it was he who prepared her poems for publication after her premature death from smallpox  on  18 January 1664 at the age of 32 – before any authorised version of her poetry was published.

 Philips turned out to be one of the very few women whose works were in wide circulation in the mid-17th century.  This happily coincides with the time of Pepys’s diary writing, and she is duly mentioned in Samuel’s diary entry for the 10th August 1667: ‘and then abroad to the New Exchange to the bookseller’s there, where I hear of several new books coming out – Mr. Pratts history of the Royal Society and Mrs. Phillips’s poems.’  

The bookseller Pepys is referring to is Henry Herringman, the publisher of Katherine Philips’s posthumous book of poetry.Herringman was surely attempting to be the persuasive salesman here and push his own publications ahead of others, though sadly Pepys doesn’t seem to have bought it – there is no copy of this publication in the Pepys Library. in 1664, just after she had returned to England from a visit to Anne in Ireland.  

In her lifetime Philips saw only two of her books in print. The first was a translation of Corneille's play La mort de Pompee, which her fellow-dramatist the Earl of Orrery had staged in Dublin, and which was printed shortly afterwards (1663). The second, unauthorized, book was Poems by the Incomparable Mrs. K.P. (1664), which was withdrawn a few days after publication because Katherine objected on the grounds that the text was inadequately printed. 

 Cotterell's "authorized" edition of the Poems appeared in 1667, with further editions in 1669, 1678, and 1710--a considerable achievment for a dead female poet. Her letters to "Poliarchus" (Cotterell) were published in 1705.  

She was also an ardent 'apostle' of friendship between women. Indeed the 'Lucasia' mentioned so lovingly in   the following poem 'Wiston Vault' was one of her intimates - Anne Owen, afterwards Viscountess Dungannon. The famous Jeremy Taylor dedicated to her a book which has friendship as its theme.

'Wiston' is a sea-coast village in Pembrokeshire. The church 'restored' in the 1860s. still exists.

Wiston Vault

Wiston Vault - Katherine Phillips 

And why the vault and Tomb? Alike we must
Put of distinction, and put on our dust;
Nor can the staliest fabric help to save
From the corruptions of a commons grave,
Nor for the Resurresction more prepare,
Than if the dust were scattered into air.
What then? Th'ambition's just, say some, that we
May thus perpetuate our memory.
Ah, false, vain task of art! ah, poor weak man
Whose monument does more than merit can!
Who by his friends' best care and love's abused,
And in his very epitaph accused;
For did they not suspect hisname would fall,
There would not need an epitaph at all.
But after death, too, I would be alive,
And shall, if my Lucasia do survive.
I quit these pomps of death, and am content,
Having her heart to be my monument:
Though ne'er stone to me, 'twill stone for me to prove,
By the peculiar miracles of love.
There I'll inscription have which no tomb gives:
Not HERE ORINDA LIES, but HERE SHE LIVES.

Their should be no platform for racists. Support the anti-fascists in Luton today. Down with the racist English Defence League.

Robert Tressell (nee Croker/Noonan) 17/ 4/1870- 3/2/11. A Ragged Trousered Philanthropist.

One hundred days ago today Robert Tressell died aged 41 of tuberculosis.
His book 'the ragged trousered philanthropist' still gives me inspiration. It has been a primary influence on a lot of my outlook. A powerful book that to this day still has social significance, still has relevance.A story of the most important struggle in history, the struggle between the underprivileged and their oppressors. So on this day I remember him with this extract. May his words continue to echoe on down through the years. If you haven't read it I strongly recommend that you do. Essential.

" Poverty is not caused by men and women getting married; it's not caused by machinery; it's not caused by 'over-production'; it is not caused by drink or laziness; and it is not caused by 'over population'. It is caused by Private Monopoly. That is the present system. They have monopolised everything that it is possible to monopolize; they have got the whole earth, the minerals in the earth and the streams that water the earth.The only reason they have not monopolised the daylight and the air is that it it is not possible to do it. If it were possible to construct huge gasometers and to draw together and compress within them the whole atmosphere, it would have been done long ago, and we should have been compelled to work for them in order to get money to buy air to breathe. And if that seemingly impossible thing were accomplished tomorrow, you would see thousands of people dying for want of air - or of the money to buy it - even as now thousands are dying for want of the other necessities of life. You would see people going about gasping for breath, and telling each other that the likes of them could not expect to have air to breathe unless they had the money to pay for it. Most of you here, for instance, would think and say so. Even as you think at present that it is right for so few people to own the Earth, the Minerals and the Water, which are all just as necessary as is the air. In exactly the same spirit as you now say: "It's their Land," "It's their Water," " It's their Coal,"
"It's Their Iron," so you would say "It'sTheir Air," "These are their gasometers, and what right have the likes of us to expect them to allow us to breathe for nothing? And even while he is doing that the air monopolist will be preaching sermons on the Brotherhood of Man; he will be dispenscing advice on "Christian Duty" in the Sunday magazines; he will give utterance to numerous more or less moral maxims for the guidance of the yound. And meantime, all around, people will be dying for want of some of the air tht he will have bottled up in his gasometers. And whn you are all dragging out a miserable existence, gasping for breath or dying for want of air, if one of your number suggests smshing a hole in the side of the gasometers, you will all fall upon him in the name of law and order, and after doing your best to tear him limb from limb, you will drg him, covered with blood, in triumph to the nearest Police Station and deliver him up to "justice," in the hope of being given a few half-pounds of air for your trouble."

EGYPT CRIES FREEDOM ! WHOSE TURN NEXT?

Watch events unfold live here.

Al Jazeera English: Live Stream - Watch Now - Al Jazeera English

St Brides' Day: Imbolc, the Celtic feast of Spring's awakening.

On a brighter note today is St Bride's day, it was after her that we named our daughter ( Bridget) . St Brigid or Bride of Kildare is said to have helped the Virgin give birth to Jesus - whence she is the protector of pregnant women and midwives - and to have kept Mary's cows, whence her title of 'Christs Milkmaid'.
The saint's pagan namesake and predecessor, the Celtic goddess Brigit, was also associated with fertility, childbirth, and cattle. On her feast day - which is also the Gaelic spring festival of Imbolc or Imbolg - Highland girls made the 'Last Sheaf' of the previous harvest into images of her, which were laid in a decorated cradle called 'Bride's Bed'.

This is the day of Bride
The Queen will come from the Mound
This is the day of Bride
The serpent will come from the hole.

On this mystic day adders were beleved to abandon their winter lairs: and the oyster-catcher birds - called in Gaelic Gille Brighde, ' the servants of Bride' - made their appearance, bringing Spring with them.
So on this day Imbolc blessings. Ok daughter. From now on Spring awakes.New hope new light. Things moving onwards in the outer world and in our hearts, starting afresh with renewed purpose and fresh possibillities. Take it easy now. Unless that is your part of a revolution that happens to be occuring , then salute.Onwards and upwards.

Falling Arab dictatorships and Israeli government panic.

Falling Arab dictatorships and Israeli government panic | rabble.ca

Will Palestine march? The tyrant exists only in the imagination of his subjects- Tamim Al- Barghouti.

Some of us are witnessing the beginniing of regime change in Tunisia and Egypt. ( I say some of us because the major news channels in the US are not reporting the massive Egyptian uprising) This is not the 'regime change' so beloved by our governments workong covertly behind their chosen despots and dictators who disenfranchise their own people and keep them in poverty and humiliation. The people on the streets in Tunisia and Egypt are not lookung for palaces and wealth. They are marching for the universal values of justice and human rights; the right not to be tortured by their own police; the right to freedom of expression; dignity and the right to choose their own leaders fair and square.
The price of food is rising. An income of $2 a day allows no room for manouvre. All over the world forests and peatlands are being ripped up to provide plantations, not for food, but for fuel to satiate the ever growing demand for energy for industry and 3 car families who will not comprehend their own greed.
$2 dollars a day is the average Egyption income. In Gaza where there is over 60%unemplyment ( due to the obliteration of Industry by the IDF) there is barely any money at all. The Palestinian Papers have served to highlight the truth we already knew - that the PA was just another western puppet, bought off and toeing the delinuwnt Zionist line.
Egypt recieves rhe second highest monetary handout, after Israel, from the US. Egypt is the puppet of America and the people will have a hard time effecting change. They know this, and their bravery is all the more remarkable because of it. Without the compliance of Egypt the Palestinians could not be kept under siege, and it is this way because our governments conspire to make it this way. The US conspires with the UN to announce the illegality of sttlements, bombings, massacres, siege and destruction, yet ensures that each of these things can happen by funding them all. Nothing is achieved except bloodshed. Rhere was no peace process. Ordinary citizens are taking to the streets and it is entirely possible that Palestinians, so badly let down by those purprting to represent them, will follow. The 7.6 million Palestinian refugees could march. The door is opening. The borders are creaking. Would Israel massacre 7.6 million people walking peacefully back to their homes, or are the thrd generation refugees so snug in their cocoon not worth the risk to life and linb after all. This may be their only chance. Public opinion os on the side of the oppressed.
Israel wants the world to forget that the right of millions of Palestinian refugees to return to the place from which they fled is enshrined in international law. The right of return is a Right. They do not need permission.



Tamim Al-Barghouti is a Palestinian poet. He is currently a visiting professor at Georgetown Univerity's Centre for Contemporary Arab Studies.

JOSE MANUEL PINTADO - INHERITANCE

Because you began to learn
that love is to blood and fire a war for freedom
for the poem marching among us
leaving fractures & losses on the bed of battle
it would be better to start over.

Our sheets still smell of fresh gunpowder
and thunder trembles in our ears.

That's why I walk the streets
of every city, town, village
the highway crosses
with you always very much within
the magnificent beast we were
leaving behind in this world
now throwing us out of its paradise.
But we also inherit a whole earth
with hoes and seeds
from where wildflowers bloom
to the fragment of world that is ours to share
without fur on the heart
in the middle of a solitary rain.

translated by John Oliver Simon
from Peace or Perish
Acrisis Anthology/Poets for Peace 1983.

SOLIDARITY WITH THE PEOPLE OF EGYPT.

The Brutality of Mubarek's regime has been rejected,but tear gazzing and shooting continues.
Inshallah Egypt shall soon be free. Ordinary people all over the world are now taking to the streets. People have decided which side they are on, on the side of the oppressed.Regime changes not always dictated by corporate or foreign powers.
In the meantime
write or phone the Egyptian Embassy in London and ask your M.P to support the protestors and do everything they can do to lift communication restrictions and stop a massacre. No to dictators.
All born free, and yesterday what was far away comes nearer, sometimes negotiations have to stop, indifference does not protect. Dignity never surrenders, dignity resists, in the name of unity, freedom and justice, with different voices we become one.

LINK FOR CONTACTING EGYPTIAN EMBASSY AND M.P AT BOTTOM.



http://noshockdoctrine.iparl.com/lobby/52

A Prayer to St Dwynwen - Dafydd ap Gwilym

Picture Of St Dwynwen

Today here in Wales is St Dwynwen's day the Welsh Patron Saint of Lovers,Dwynwen lived in the fifth century and like so many popular old tales there are several versions of her story. It is said that Dwynwen was the daughter of a Welsh king called Brychan Brycheiniog and came from Brecon. Some accounts say that Brychan had 24 daughters while others claim he had 36. Dwynwen was considered to be the most beautiful of them all - so quite an honour!

Dwynwen fell in love with Maelon, the son of another king. They wanted to get married but her father had other ideas. Brychan Brycheiniog had already arranged for Dwynwen to marry someone else. Dwynwen ran to the forest, distraught, and prayed to God to release her from love. An angel came to visit her and gave her a potion to make her forget about Maelon and to turn him to ice. After this, God appeared to her and gave her three wishes. 

First, Dwynwen wished that Maelon was thawed. 

Secondly, she wished that God would help all true lovers. 

Finally, she wished that she would never be married.

After the wishes were granted Dwynwen became a nun and established a convent on an island. The island, Ynys Llanddwyn, is just off the coast of Anglesey. 'Ynys' means island in Welsh, 'Llan' means 'church' and 'dwyn' comes from the name 'Dwynwen'. 

 According to the story, there was a fish, who lived in a well near the church, that could predict the future of couples. If a couple went there and the water bubbled then the couple would have good luck. As a result the church and well became a place of pilgrimage in the middle ages.  The ruins of the convent can still be seen on the island. 

To mark St Dwynwen's day I thought I'd post a poem dedicated to her by Dafydd ap Gwilym. His poems were so fine that all the bards of his day called him their chief bard, and today is looked upon as the greatest Welsh poet of all times. He lived probably from 1320 to 1380 and it is thought that he was born in the village of Brogynin, Penrhyncoch, Wales, Cardiganshire or what is now known as Ceredigion here in West Wales.

He became a traveller wandering from place to place and was welcomed everywhere because of his great gifts as a bard. It is possible he heard the Norman minstrels sing their songs of love in the English courts, and that he was so struck by their charm, that he decided to sing the praises to the lovely maidens and noble princes of his own country. His poems won the hearts of maidens and the lords became his patrons. It is natural that some poets were jealous of his fame, and there were many bitter quarrels with his rivals.

It is difficult to give an English reader an idea of the beauty of his work. He composed in forms unknown to the English poet until recently in the cywydd metre .Trained in the Welsh bardic tradition, Dafydd ap Gwilym wrote predominantly in rhymed couplets, with the compound expressions and complex syntax that mark medieval Welsh poetry. His poems feature variations on the cynghanedd, a Welsh form using consonantal echo, and often rhyme, within the unit of the line. The form gave a musical rhythm to the poem that was more suitable to the Welsh Language.

They have incredible power and a lot of people say that to truly understand them one must read his poems in the language that they were written.

In his poems he was able to charm the nightingale, the blackbird and the swallow into telling him their secrets. He conversed with nature and bid her reveal her mysteries. He could win the love of women and at the same time the admiration of men. He brought all things under the spell of his muse. He hated anything false but admired all that is beautiful, whether in forest glade and flower, or in the lovely form of a maiden. His poetry, notable for its vivid imagery, is at turns erotic, comic, and thoughtful in its exploration of love and the natural world. So on this day here's his prayer to St Dwynwen. Whatever your religious convictions it's still pretty powerful stuff. Hope you enjoy it. For the Lovers, heddwch,Peace

Dwynwen deigr arien degwch,
Da y gwyr o gor fflamgwyr fflwch
Dy ddelw aur diddoluriaw
Digion druain ddynion draw
Dyn a wylio gloywdro glan,
Yn dy gor, Indeg eirian,
Nid oes glefyd na bryd brwyn
A el ynddo o Landdwyn.

Dy laesblaid yw dy lwysblwyf,
Dolurus ofalus wyf;
Y frn hon o hoed gordderch
Y sydd yn unchwydd o serch;
Hirwayw o sail gofeiliant,
Herwydd oy gwn, hwn yw haint,
Oni chaf, o byddaf byw
Forfudd, Llyna oferfyw
Gwna fi'n iach, weddusach wawd,
O'm anwychder a'm nychdawd.
Cymysg lateirwydd flwyddyn
A rhadau Duw rhod a dyn.
Nid rhaid, ddelw euraid ddilyth,
Yt ofn pechawd, fethgnawd fyth.
Nid adwna, da ei dangef,
Duw a wnaeth, nid ei o nef.
Ni'th wyl mursen eleni
Yn hustyng yn yng a ni.
Ni rydd Eiddig ddig ddyngnbwyll
War ffon i ti, wyry ei phwyll.

Tyn, o'th obr, taw, ni thybir
Wrthyd, wyry gymhlegyd hir,
O landdwyn, dir gynired,
I Gwm-y-gro, gem y Gred.
Duw ni'th omeddawdd, hawdd hedd,
Dawn iaith aml, dyn ni'th omedd.
Diamau weddiau waith,
Duw a'th eilw, duw ei thalaith.
Delid Duw, dy letywr,
Del i gof, dwylaw a gwr,
Traws oedd y neb a'i trisai,
Dwynwen, pes parud unwaith
Dan wydd Mai a hirddydd maith,
Dawn ei bardd, da, wen, y bych;
Dwynwen, nid oeddud anwych
Dangos o'th radau dawngoeth
Nad wyd fursen, Ddwynwen ddoeth.

Er a wnaethost yn ddawbwys
O benyd y byd a'i bwys;
Er y crefydd, ffydd ffyddryw,
A wnaethost tra fuost fyw;
Er y eirian leianaeth
A wwyrfdawd y coethgnawd caeth;
Er enaid, os rhaid y rhawg,
Brychan Yrth breichiau nerthawg;
Eiriol, er dy greuol gred,
Ar em Wyry roi ymwared.

Dwynwen, your beauty like the hoar-fros's tears:
from your chancel with its blazing waxen candles
well does your golden image know
how to assuage the griefs of wretched men.
What a man so ever would keep vigil in your choir
(a holy, shining pilgrimage), (you with) Inded's radiance,
there is no sickness nor heart's sorrow
which he would carry with him thence from LLanddwyn.

Your holy parish is your straggling flock:
(a man) sorrowful and worn with care I am;
because of longing for my mistress
my heart is swollen with love,
deep pangs grounded in anxiety,
as well I know - this is my malady-
unless I can win Morfudd
if I remain alive, it is but life in vain.
Make me be healed, you most deserving of all praise,
from my infirmity and feebleness.
as well as mediatrix of God's grace to man.
There is no need for you, unfailing golden image,
to be afraid of sin, the body's ever-present snare.
God does not undo what he has once done,
good is his peaceful disposition, you will not fall from heaven.
No coquette will observe you now this year
whispering with us in a narrow corner.
No angry Jealous one, cruel minded,
will put a cudgel to your back chaste-minded one.

Come of your kindness - quiet, you will not be suspect,
Virgin of enduring sympathy,
from Llanddwyn, a place of great resort,
to Cwm-y-gro, you gem of Christendom.
God has not withheld from you easy to be reconciled,
the gift of ample speech, nor will man reject you.
Unquestionably to the work of prayer
God calls you black you wimple.
May God, your host restain
the two hands of that man - may there be recalled
the violence of the person who would ravish her
when she would follow me through the leaves of May.
Dwynwen, if you would once cause
under May's trees, and in long summer days
her poet's reward - fair one, you would be good,
for, Dwynwen, you were never base.
Prove, by your gifts of splendid grace
that you are no prim virgin, prudent Dwynwen.

Because of the penance that you did
through goodness, for the world, and its significance,
because of the devotions that you kept,
while you were alive, the faith of all those of religious kind,
because of the true dedication of a nun,
and the virginity of the fair captive flesh
for the soul's sake - if it be needful now-
of Brychan with the powered strong arms-
implore, by the agony caused by your faith,
of the sweet Virgin to deliver me.

FROM:-
Selected Poems of Daffyd Ap Gwilym
Translated by Rachel Bromwich
Penguin Books 1985
An earlier  post on St Dwynwens day can be found here.https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.com/2010/01/st-dwynwens-day-welsh-patron-saint-of.html

  

 Dafydd ap Gwilym by W. Wheatley Wagstaff. Marble. City Hall, Cardiff.